Various linear gauges have been heretofore used for positioning work pieces in front of a saw, drill or punch or other machinery utilized in working on a specific location on a work piece such as a block or elongated piece of wood, metal or plastic. Some such devices have utilized an adjustable stop member moveable along a scale such as a tape measure and adjustably positionable along a guiding and supporting platform provided with incremental stop means such as precision machine gear teeth. One such commercially available device is the Sampson Model AG Linear Gauge marketed by Sampson Automation Company of Hauppauge, New York. Such devices have heretofore been relatively costly and in some cases subject to the possibility that pressure on the stop element of the gauge could cause the adjustable component to jump from one setting to another by jumping from one tooth to another.